Parents of toddler wondering if it’s normal to be this exhausted

Hugs and empathy for you mama. It's so hard. I couldn't even consider a second until my first was two, because I couldn't imagine being more tired than I already was. Now we have an almost 2 and almost 6 year old, and while we're still tired, it gets better. The two-full-time careers thing is a grind, I don't think there's any escaping that, but it will get easier as your kid gets older. The first winter season at daycare is the worst. It just sucks. It gets better. 

Hello! Mother of two here. One of the most helpful things I've heard is 'it feels hard because it IS hard.' It doesn't mean you are doing anything wrong. This 'sick season', especially, is really, really tough. However, one thing you did not mention and I have found makes a BIG difference in my energy levels, is my diet/hydration. If I minimize my sugar intake and make sure to eat protein/nutritious foods instead of just snacking and mindlessly eating, then I have loads more energy. Same with drinking a TON of water. (This is not to say I do this all the time, I am only human after all! But I always feel so much better when I am very mindful of my eating/drinking habits.) Just remember, it is a tough season- both toddlerhood, and winter- and it will pass! 

Unfortunately it's totally normal, and the first cold season in daycare is HARSH.  It gets better in subsequent years though!

Both me (40) and my husband (also 40) work full time with minimal grandparent help and my husband is also a startup founder so he's gone a lot. We just had our second child in may and our first is nearly 4 now, and I can tell you that we are tired ALLLLL the time.  It sounds like you're doing all the things we've been doing to make things 'better' - from the weekend care (though ours is a regular nanny who takes her for 4 hours on one weekend day every weekend), to alternating shifts, and arranging things so each parent gets a 'night off'.  You're doing the best you can - Unfortunately, little kids are just exhausting.  One thing that does help - organize outings to the park or other places with other families from daycare. Then you get the benefit of 'distributed parenting'.  The benefit of this approach gets even better as the kids get a little older.  Around 2.5-3ish is when I started seeing the greatest benefit where the kids started playing together instead of demanding 1:1 parent attention all the time.  Sadly, a state of fatigue is 'normal' until the kids get to elementary school or so from what I hear... then the kids have different issues. 

For having the second child:  a postpartum doula was super key for me, and mine helped set the baby's sleep patterns so she's a good sleeper.  Right now, I currently have a 'mother's helper' in the evening who picks up my baby from her daycare and brings her home, helps occupy the older one while I eat and put the baby to bed, and then cleans up the kitchen and meal preps for us.  It's super helpful for days where my husband is traveling or working late.  The other thing, honestly is embracing additional screen time.  The older one gets to play PBSkids games while I put the baby down when I'm by myself. It wouldn't work otherwise.  

To be sure, there's always a certain amount of exhaustion inherent in parenting little children. But in my experience, sleep is key -- it sounds like you aren't giving your body the time it needs to recuperate and repair itself from the illnesses you've been through and the general wear and tear of being a parent. I know the discussion surrounding sleep training can be fraught, but I literally cannot imagine being up for hours in the middle of the night and then working a full-time demanding job. I'd recommend you sleep train the kid. It's gonna be rough (it was for us, with both kids), but worth it in the end. Some kids don't need help learning how to sleep through the night, and some do -- ours did, and were happier kids once they mastered that skill. You'll be amazed at how much better everyone feels once they're getting the sleep they need. Good luck!

Both of my kids went through a phase for about a year when they were sick all the time. (First big exposures to outside germs.) Luckily, after that their immune system‘s really kicked in and it’s been much easier this year. I also got almost every cold, and would take several weeks to recover, and it was very exhausting. Hopefully this is the only truly rough cold season your child will have as they get all their first exposures out of the way.

it helps me with my high energy boys to do activities outside of the home as much as possible, ideally outdoors. In general I keep my expectations low and my plans realistic. Strict sleep training has made a big difference. Encourage your child to play independently and don’t feel the need to rush to their side for every whine or cry immediately (unless they are hurt of course). If you need to be indoors, long bubble baths and popsicle baths kill a lot of time. My husband and I take turns with nighttime and morning routines and cleaning. None of this is a perfect solution, but I hope some of these things are helpful. 

This was our life, except we had two babies. It gets better! By about age 3, they start catching fewer illnesses. 

Wow, never has a post resonated so much with me. I am the mother of a 3.5 year old, and my husband and I are also always exhausted. We are both older parents, so that may be part of it (I am 45 and he is 54). My husband works full time and I work part time and my daughter is in full-time day care. Neither of us have parents who can help us and babysitting is very expensive. I keep thinking that maybe I have chronic fatigue or long COVID because of the level of exhaustion. But my husband, who is a physician says our exhaustion is just because we have a toddler. Ha. Only thing I could suggest is getting a regular sitter to help for one morning or afternoon on the weekends to give you a break. 

I feel your pain! Our 2nd child is 2, does not sleep through the night, and wakes up at 5AM. Right now he's waking up once per night but sometimes he wakes up 3 times per night and it can take an hour+ to get him back to sleep. His energy is insane. We thought our first had a lot of energy, which he did, but our second has also always been extremely mobile early on and climbs everything, including up onto the dining room table daily. He is very strong willed and challenges us constantly. If he had been our first born, I would have been terrified to have a 2nd! Of course you never know how your kids are going to turn out and this is not research based, but I don't know that I have ever met parents who describe both of their children as quite so extreme. There's usually an "easier" or more calm kid, or at least maybe by the time the older one reaches a certain age, things start to calm down with them b/c they're more in control of their emotions. It's definitely hard with our 2nd child being the more challenging one as we don't have the same energy or dedicated 1:1 time to focus on just him, but we both always knew we wanted 2 kids and I'm very happy we did. I really can't imagine life without our challenging, but hilarious 2nd wild-child.

One thing that stands out to me is that both of your jobs sound so demanding. My cousin is a professor and her husband is a chemist. They have two kids who are on the calm and quiet side and both sleep very well, but they are still completely exhausted. My job is busy but it's extremely flexible and understanding when it comes to family. This is a huge factor to helping me through every single week. I know there's probably not a whole lot that you can change in that area, but I can imagine the stress of your jobs is contributing to your overall outlook.

Cold/flu seasons are horrible. We got everything imaginable last season at the worst possible time, e.g. our son got Covid the week before his 2 week break at school and ruined Xmas. It is SO exhausting getting sick back-to-back. I'm literally getting over being sick right now. It's so hard to parent when you don't feel well. My friends with K-5 aged kids say it really does get better when they're older.

I don't have a whole lot of advice, but I don't think you're doing anything wrong. If your jobs can be at all flexible, take advantage. If you can afford help on the weekends, take it. I don't know how old your toddler is but I have seen positive changes in our older son starting at 4.5. He's starting to be able to control his emotions better and verbalize his feelings without hitting. Things are not perfect and are still hard but things really do start getting easier as they get older and can be trusted on their own more! Also, we are very hopeful that when the younger one is a little older the two kids will play more and more together which will make our lives easier, so that could also be motivation to have another.

Hang in there!

You are not alone and I feel doing nothing wrong…I find it truly is as exhausting as you feel. My kids are little older now and parts are easier and at night we sleep better most nights but it’s a constant juggle. And yes a series of back to back illnesses like that can take a family down physically and mentally! 

One area you didn’t mention are meals. Is there a way to prep some meals ahead or simplify meals all around? Some nights of prepared foods or take out, a pizza/salad night, quick things like quesadillas and soup? My kids also love breakfast for dinner—once I allowed myself to not feel so guilty about not having more elaborate dinners that helped free up some time. 

I’m so happy you are able to add in some couple time on the weekends—even once a month helps greatly. If helpful, we found it easier to go from 1 to 2 kids than 0 to 1. We were more used to the lack of rest and madness family life brings. 

Hi there - first, just wanted to say it doesn’t sound like you are doing anything wrong! Every kid and every family’s situation is a bit different but your description sounds within the range of normal, albeit maybe on the tougher end - for now. Your child will build immunity and become more independent with time! Keep protecting each other’s free time, lower standards where you can (e..g. house cleaning, volunteering), etc. and at some point, it’ll feel less like survival. This was very similar to our experience so hope you can take some comfort in knowing you’re certainly not alone (common, even!) and that it will get better. We had a second kid and the jump from 0 to 1 was so hard but 1 to 2 was, in comparison, rainbows and butterflies. What got us through was having a “team mentality” between partners which it sounds like you already have, and building a community (daycare will help in that regard) of parents to help confirm what’s in the range of “normal” and at a minimum, feel better when you hear a parent vent about their issues which may be even harder than yours. Lastly, keep up with sleep training if it’s been working - growth spurts, travel, and sickness may lead to regressions but having the foundation of sleep was really helpful for our kids. Us being well-rested (most of the time) and the kids getting enough sleep feels like half the battle. Take care!

I suspect you will get a LOT of responses on this and I hope most them emphathize and emphasize this is within the realm of normal and you are doing nothing wrong! The illnesses alone (which are so normal in first years of daycare) will exhaust you, and that's not accounting for the full-time work and general hecticness of having a toddler! Add in the inconsistent sleep and it's a recipe for exhaustion. I don't have a lot of specific advice other than encouraging the ongoing "shift work" where each person gets breaks and an uninterrupted night sleep. It does get better but that might take... years. With that being said, spring and summer should bring fewer illnesses and next respiratory season should have fewer illnesses now that he has more antibodies and as he gets bigger he may sleep better so there is light at the end of the tunnel! Hang in there! 

I don't know how to structure your lives better, but it sounds exactly like my experience and I don't think you are doing anything "wrong" (although I remember having the exact same feeling ALL THE TIME). If I could go back in time I do think I could've had my first kid do more for themselves even at a younger age. Little things like getting themselves a drink, getting dressed, putting away their stuff. Sometimes they are painfully slow at it and there are a million things my kids just always looked to me to provide that they probably could've just gotten for themselves (especially my oldest). I don't think it would've eliminated the exhausting feeling of parenting a toddler while working full time. Humans are just not built to do that many things at one time, but one day you will wake up and your kid will be a couple years older and everything will feel so much more manageable.

As to having a second, I spaced mine six years because the first one was so exhausting I couldn't even contemplate being pregnant let alone caring for another human in the house. But once we had him I realized that you are already maxed out no matter what and the kids seem to kind of normalize to what is possible. In retrospect I might have just powered through having two closer in time and been done with that phase sooner. The spirited ones are hard when they are younger but a lot of fun when they get more self-sufficient.  

Hi! I'm guessing you will get a lot of responses like this, but just to add:

YOU ARE DOING NOTHING WRONG.

Thanks for speaking up about how hard it is. I've totally been you-the EXACT descriptions you shared about your exhaustion. 

It is just SO difficult. Especially when you have a tough sleeper. Parents who have easy sleepers do not understand how difficult it is to be a parent to a tough sleeper.

Two thoughts, in case it is helpful:

1) It will get better. I promise!! It will. Two things absolutely will change with time. First, your next winter will be smoother. Your child is getting hit hard with germ exposure. It is BRUTAL. But it is building his immune system and you all will have a smoother fall and winter next year. It is hard to believe, but nothing, nothing is as bad as the first winter in a group care setting. Second, your child will get easier. Probably in about six months. I've found that with my two children, turning 2 is actually a huge relief and not the nightmare so many make it out to be. 

2) There is nothing that you are doing right or wrong to impact your child's sleep. I don't know if this is helpful, because it does mean you just have to roll with it (SO HARD), but this is who your child is. My oldest was a TERRIBLE sleeper and still has some challenges (he's almost 7). His current sleep challenges are nothing compared to when he was a toddler, where his situation was very similar to yours. I made everything worse by agonizing over his sleep and stressing about how each night would go.

It eventually improved, but not because of anything I did. Just time and growth.

When he was about your son's age, I also thought I wanted another child but could not IMAGINE how to make that happen given my exhaustion. Again, things gradually got easier. We eventually got more and more time, better sleep and felt (semi) confident we could do it again.

My children have a four year age gap, and the second is a MUCH better sleeper. Again, nothing we did-that's just how he is.

Anyway, I just hope you can give yourself some peace and know it is not you. This is an unbelievably difficult season (especially with two working parents, it is so hard). Sending lots of encouragement your way and I promise, it will get better.

Somewhat recently tenured research intensive faculty mom here with 2 littles.  I want to let you know you aren't alone! Academia already requires a ton of context switching and the cognitive load of adding caring for a small human on top of that is very real. We are also stretched very thin.  It feels manageable when the kids are sleeping through the night but rapidly becomes unmanageable when they don't, which is often.  The toll of the fall/winter illness season is high! I don't have any real solutions for you as it sounds like you are doing all the "right" things.  The two things I'd say is 1) I've heard it gets better and 2) if you can, master the art of letting things go.   Both of those pieces of advice are pretty trite, so feel free to DM me if you want to discuss further.

You are doing nothing wrong and considering you are both working full time, not getting solid sleep, constant illness, keeping up with an energetic toddler, and not having a ton of support outside of daycare, it makes complete sense that you are exhausted. My husband and I have two (ages 4 and almost 2) and around the 1.5 mark with my first I started feeling a little more rested and more like myself...enough to accidentally get pregnant with our second. We weren't quite ready for another and the second kid has totally kicked our butts. Not because he's tough but because of all the same reasons you stated. We both work full time (probably more than that) and we don't get help from our families. Our kids are in daycare but when our kids are home on the weekend, we're not relaxing. Our toddlers are a lot of work! It makes me wish we lived in a commune sometimes so we had a "village" to help with the kids. Which brings up some ideas to make things easier. Find organized activites to do with your child on the weekends with friends who have kids the same age. We started doing ballet and soccer with my daughter. My friend and I are able to sneak in a mini coffee date while our daughters do ballet and we get to chat with our friends during soccer practice. Our kids are exhausted after and it feels nice to socialize/commiserate with parents who are at a similar stage in parenting as we are. Find family-friendly places to have dates if you're unable to get a sitter. We like Sideboard in Lafayette for a picnic on the lawn, Nido's Backyard (a Tres Rojas cocktail for the adults and quesadillas and guac for the kids), or wine tasting at family-friendly wineries in Healdsburg for special occaisions (Truett Hurst and Bella to name a couple). Trips to the farmers' market on weekends is a way to make grocery shopping more fun and enjoyable. We go on Sundays and then meal-plan around our seasonal ingredients for the week. I realize that all of this probably sounds like more things to add to your plate (that might exhaust you more) but when my kids are out and about, everyone has more fun, there are less tantrums, and they sleep harder. I think the biggest thing to keep in mind (and I'm sure you've heard this a lot) is that this is just the season of life you are in and it will be over before you know it. You will sleep again and your toddler will eventually become more self-sufficient. 

Hi there, totally get it. We felt the same way. I've heard it gets better as the kids get older. Apparently that's why people have more than one kid. Once it gets better they forget how hard it was. There are a few things we did. I hope they help:
1. The biggest issue is sleep - our daughter was always a pretty good sleeper but needed constant sleep training. The book Precious Little Sleep did an amazing job. Several other parents have recommended this book. We followed the advice from the book for the most part. Your biggest return-on-investment though is trying to fix sleep. We did also hire a sleep consultant - Randi Johnson - she's local in the East Bay and did an amazing job helping us train our daughter as young as 3 months old. Her rates are pretty consistent with how much sleep trainers charge.
2. We have no family nearby, but when grandparents visit, we just ask them to watch our daughter while we rest or do chores around the house.
3. Hiring a cleaner is a good decision. I would consider meal services also - three stone hearth, olivesf, tiffinbay are all good options. If you have friends or family who can do a meal train for you that would be even better.
4. We do very simple groceries. I've got it down to 1.5 hours/week including travel, purchasing and putting them away. We have a running list of about 20 or so different meals that we just cycle through. So i always know what groceries to look for. It makes cooking easier too.
5. I've heard from parents of older children that it doe get easier around 3-5 years old. Far fewer illnesses, they can eat by themselves and even help a little bit around the house if you start early enough.
6. I work from home while my wife's work requires her to go into the office 4 days a week. I take on a lot of the chores around the house which i get done during lunch time or slow days at work. If one of you could work from home, that'll solve some of this.

This was my family last year! You will get through it. Kids normally go through daycare sick as dogs the first year but the second year is better. I also feel that COVID hits the immune system so hard that your system is simply just more vulnerable to other things in the immediate three-ish months after your officially recover. One thing that I wish we would have done earlier... NyQuil. I know, controversial for a young body but same as your family, my second kid woke up at least three times a night, screetching, full of mucus.. when kids don't sleep they can't fight off infections, period. So I spoke with a friend who is a pharmacist about the situation and he said a small dose will help. It did. If we lived in a world that allowed families to not work during these early years without adversely affecting short and long term income I'd stay at home, but alas, that's not how the world works.

Best of luck! 

My husband and I frequently feel wiped, as you do, after bedtime and our daughter (2.5 yo) is an A+ sleeper who never wakes up. She did wake up at 5 instead of 7am the other day and it was so exhausting. I don’t know that you’re doing anything wrong. Only getting full nights of sleep part of the time with 2-3 hours awake is a recipe for never feeling “normal.” It is a big barrier for us to have a 2nd because we expect we wouldn’t get another kiddo who loves sleep this much. 
 

There are things you can do if you can pay extra money to get back flexibility- we pay someone to cook a batch of meals for us each week. I also work 4 days per week and that day of alone time with childcare is amazing. Could your parents take your son for a morning every weekend or two so you guys could have more adult time together? An adult brunch out followed by some mindless solo time until you pick him up, etc. And also worth giving yourself permission to have weekends without any outings IF your kiddo is happy playing at home, or doing the minimum like a park trip instead of feeling any pressure to make weekends “special.”

You don’t say how old your child is. Some of it is that it is tiring and little kids get sick a lot. We found that by age five kids are getting sick a lot less and that really helps. 
 

Trading off with your husband is essential not just for sleep but making sure you and your husband both get some bona fide downtime for a couple of hours every week. Scheduling some help is a great idea. 
 

so I think you are on the right track. It does also sound like you have to improve sleep routines so that little one is sleeping through the night more often. A sleep consultant is probably worth it by that age. 

Sorry you are feeling so exhausted! I’ve felt like that before after getting hit with back to back illnesses. It is the worst and one of the hardest parts of being a parent. There’s no rest for the weary!

As for, is it normal? I think it’s normal to feel exhausted sometimes, but not all the time. I think you have three factors making life extra hard right now. 1.You both have demanding careers 2.Your kid doesn’t sleep well/ doesn’t sleep a lot. 3.It sounds like you have family around, but not necessarily family help. For number 1, it doesn’t sound like this is a changeable factor. Number 2 could get better with time. Or you could try making some changes, and see what happens. I don’t want to bore you with a bunch of sleep advice because I assume you’ve heard it before :)

For number 3, this could be just what it is, but have you asked either grandparent if they would be willing to take on a little more? There’s a huge potential here for mutual benefit for everyone - they get to bond with their grandchild, kid has fun, you get a break. If there’s a knee jerk reaction you have as to why this won’t work, take some time to examine that reason. In the family/ community vein, do you have good friends that you trust that have expressed interest in helping or hanging out with your kid more? Take them up on it! You can start slow by hanging out together before throwing them in the toddler deep end.

Odds and ends- we do bath for my toddler every other night, barring extreme circumstances. I try to cook in leftover friendly batches, so I can avoid cooking every night. Toddler eats what we eat more or less. If something is a total fail they have cereal or something like that instead. TV, toddler watches some TV now. Keep it simple, repeat the hell out of whatever works, and try to find things that the whole family enjoys together. Hopefully some of this resonates! Wishing you easier times ahead.

My two kids are now older but I still remember how tiring it was when they were toddlers and so dependent on us for everything. I don't miss the evening gauntlet of getting home, fixing dinner, feeding the kids, cleaning/bathing the kid and putting them to bed--all the while hoping that you will still be awake to have some adult time after they go down.  But at 19 months your kid should be able to stay asleep long enough for you to have some "you time."  The level of sleep deprivation that you are describing is more akin to the newborn stage. I advise that you locate a sleep specialist to advise you on techniques for having your toddler stay asleep. Your son being awake for 2 to 3 hours on some nights seems unusual and perhaps a specialist could suggest techniques to get him back to sleep or for him to self-soothe himself back to sleep. If nothing else, keep in mind that these phases will pass and before you know it, your son will be a teenager who will sleep in until 10am on weekends!

Solidarity! I'm a parent of a 1 year old and 4 year, and I find parenting time exhausting. My partner and I also both work full-time, but even the after-hours (5pm to 9/10pm) feels like a slog. My 1 year old only sleeps decently because I co-sleep with them, I've never been able to get them to nap on their own. (They do nap in a stroller with nanny, but I don't have the magic stroller touch). It's rough when they're sick, but I invested in a floor mattress and a really nice pillow with neck support and arm rests, so I can sleep sitting up if it comes to that. I don't necessarily recommend co-sleeping since it means I don't get any actual alone time, but I think it's better for my personal sleep success.

I've started asking our nanny to take the 1 year old for a few hours on the weekend or a few hours after the workday, and that time with the 4 year old gives me a break from the demands of a toddler. I love my toddler, but they require a huge amount of energy and constant supervision, with all the shenanigans they get into. (Oh, and they screech if mommy leaves the room..)

As for having a second: my experience is that the 4 year old is decently independent at this point, it's really just the 1 year old that's the big energy suck. Sooo hopefully it gets better for you!

I also had a toddler who was spirited and a poor sleeper, and I was pretty darn exhausted most of the time. If the wake-ups you are suffering are from illness, then that sounds grindingly hard but indeed will surely be temporary (the “constantly getting colds” phase doesn’t last forever—in our case maybe 6-10 months?). If poor sleep is more general (or becomes so due to the illnesses), then that’s something you can work on. For us, the book The Happy Sleeper provided ideas that improved things significantly. If that doesn’t add anything new, then I guess I can simply offer some hope by saying that my kiddo didn’t sleep through the night more than once in a blue moon until a few months past 2—and then sleep became really easy, and has remained so as he approaches 7. (Once we had a second kid, life became pretty inherently exhausting for another couple years—in our case the second was an easy sleeper, but daytimes were hard, as our older kiddo had a really hard time accepting the loss of our exclusive attention. Still, if you want another hopeful note, we have finally made it to a more manageable (and fun!) place, and having our second child definitely feels worth it).

Yes. This. Is. Normal.

In fact, with local family and house cleaners, I’d say you are better off than most.

There are local parent groups. Locate. Educate. And get outside your bubble. Perspective is imperative to understanding your particular situation. Your feelings are real, but we are all going through it. We used to party until 4am in NYC and sleep until 12noon. Parenthood doesn’t hold a candle to our previous life. Embrace the change and accept the exhaustion. Your previous life is no more. No one tells you this when having kids. We ❤️ them to pieces, but our old lives are - in the words of JT - Dead and Gone.

Oh I feel for you. Hang in there, it does get easier. It didn't get easier for us until our older one turned 4. There were less tantrums and more independence so became emotionally and physically less difficult. It's hard with all the illnesses in the winter. Once they build some semblance of an immune system against colds it gets slightly better. I just got the stomach bug from my son from his school and it was rough with multiple kids under 5 sick and the entire family sick. 

My son is 24 now and I still remember 19 mos. as being the nadir. Well, except teaching him to drive; that was worse, but in a different way.  You sound like you have a good system, particularly the trading off so one parent can be alone for a few hours.  In my household, Dad did not enjoy taking the kid to the park, but was happy to take him on errands (even Costco!)  That got the errands knocked out and also got me some alone time.   Also, do you have any friends with similar aged kids? You can take turns - you watch theirs with yours, then they take yours.  That's also tough when everyone is getting sick all the time but at some point it might work.  

I think the two key factors are (1) the kid isn't sleeping well and (2) the two full-time demanding jobs.  Consider hiring a sleep consultant to get the kid to sleep through the night.  I would really focus on this because if you can sleep normally on a regular basis it will change your life.  

And I'm going to tell you something straight - if you decide to have another kid, you should both scale back at work.  Figure out a way to work part-time for your pregnancy and the first five years of your second child's life.

I have two words for you, NIGHT NANNY. Hire a nanny for at least 4 weeks to take care of your boy at night so you can have a chance at a full night's sleep for an extended period of time. You have a large sleep deficit that will just get worse with your schedule of alternating nights taking care of your boy. If possible move yourself or your son apart so when he wakes during the night and the nanny is taking care of him, he does not wake you.

Mom of three under 7 and tenured academic here. You’ve gotten some awesome sympathy and advice. I’d like to add a few briefs practical tips, with one overarching them: spend money on all the  periphery so you can focus on the best part—spending calm and joyful time with your kid:

1. The prepared food section at TJ is your friend. Meal plan and keep that aspect simple (there will be time for exciting food again; now is not that time).

2. Hire a sleep consultant and follow whatever regimen you’re happy with. We never did cry it out, but were still able to improve the situation dramatically. Also fantastic for the kids, better rest, lifelong healthy habits— Best $500 you’ll ever spend.

3. If you’re like me, a decluttered home would greatly improve your mental space. A chaotic cluttered home can send me into a spiral of despair and physical exhaustion. Tackle that problem with a combination of assorted bins from Home Goods and a cleaner who also helps organize.

I just want to second- 

Yes this is totally normal!

It is so worth it to hire a sleep/parenting consultant. It can be easier.